ESG and Corporate Performance: Evidence from Agriculture and Forestry Listed Companies
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is an interesting article that investigated the impact of ESG on corporate performance of 156 listed agricultural and forestry companies from 2009 to 2021.
-The introduction is well-written with relevant references.
-The literature review clearly indicates the research gap.
-The research models, hypotheses development and research method applied to address the research questions are interesting.
-The findings of this study are based on empirical research.
Overall the flow of the paper is good. The sub-topics are linked well. The entire work structure (in terms of organisation and readability) is clear and the article is fairly written and easy to understand.
Shortcomings
- Discussion needs major revision. It has to be in-depth and based on each hypothesis.
- Discussion and implications could be written as separate sub headings before the conclusion.
- Literature review is absent for control variables.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
I believe that the research carried out by the authors has a pioneering character. They are especially important in the 21st century, when the ESG concept is slowly becoming a business practise. In view of the weak interest of companies' owners and managers in the implementation of ESG as a business strategy, the proposed model and the results obtained are of theoretical and application importance.
The advantages of the research and the results developed are as follows:
1. The proposed empirical model can be used for research in other sectors and countries.
2. The results show specific relationships, which should be significant for practise.
3. The number of data taken into account allows the formulation of general conclusions.
4. The research process is presented in a logical, orderly, and understandable way.
Indeed, I think that the empirical model developed is too general. For a person less familiar with the literature on the subject, this may make it difficult to understand the results obtained.
In view of the advantages mentioned above, I think that it should be published.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear authors, thanks for submission of your paper.
The paper aims to explore the impact of ESG on corporate performance, both theoretically and empirically, using Two-stage Least Squares. The paper is well written according to the requirements, it aims to answer the relevant field problem to explore the impact of ESG on corporate performance.
The importance of the study is clearly stated and supported by the literature. The research methodology and data collection are described in detail and supported with references.
The paper empirically analyzed relevant data from 156 listed agricultural and forestry companies in China from 2009 to 2021, guided by stakeholder theory and controlling for reverse causality. Additionally, this paper investigated the moderating effects of tax incentives, regional marketization degree, and the proportion of female executives from the perspectives of government, market, and company.
The paper is organized logically, the methodology and data collection processes are explained in detail and supported with references.
The conclusions of the paper are consistent with the results of the study. The contributions of the paper are stated and the ways of implementation of received results are discussed, and suggestions for future studies are provided. The main contribution of the paper is the analysis of the influence mechanism of ESG on corporate performance from the perspectives of the government, the market, and the company itself, and the causal relationship between the two.
Based on stated above, the paper can be recommended for publication.
Author Response
Thank you for your encouraging comment!
